Tearing Me Apart

Summary:
Emily/Sam/Leah multi-chaptered fic. Set post-BD, Sam decides to find some of those acquaintances of Carlisle's and take them down. He has a new lead on the human killers, and goes on a three-week trip to get to them. Who does he elect to bring with him? The one pack member who has nothing to loose. Anymore. Leah Clearwater runs with him in dead silence, until one day she breaks down and reveals the truth. He finds he has a choice to make... again.

Notes:
So... my first multi-chaptered Sam/Leah. all the others have been one-shots. and this one may actually have a happy ending. Spoilers for BD. Adult for Leah's naughty words and possibly some innuendo in later chapters.

3. Chapter 3

We are running through the woods, side by side, following a strong and foul scent, when Sam asks it. How did you end up this way?

Huh?

When we were together. He flashes me a memory, his big fingers sliding a ring on my hand, his huge smile bright against his face, me laughing and laughing and… You weren’t like this. Did all the… all the…

The pain? I’d named it that. It was appropriate. All the feelings from guilt to anger to simple grief that I’d shoved behind a rock-hard fortress in my mind were facets of it.

Yeah. Where’d all the pain come from? From your dad? From being the only girl? From not being able to have kids? What?

God, you are an imbecile, I growl. Can he really not see it? Didn’t we just talk about this yesterday? Can you be this stupid? Do you really not know?

What?

It’s you, idiot. Of course I wasn’t a bitch then. I had you. I wasn’t a bitch when you loved me because you loved me. I was nice then. Because I was happy. And then you broke my heart and spit in my face. That changed things. It changed me.

I feel his sigh. The rush of earth beneath my feet is the only thing that keeps me going, plodding on through the painful story of the darkest point of my life, the brief spurt of agony before I learned how to spread it out and turn forever into monotonous suffering, not pure, sheer torture. When you phased the first time and didn’t tell me, I tried to stop trusting you. But I couldn’t pull away. I loved you too much… I couldn’t pull away from you. I was in too deep already. I couldn’t get away from it at that point. There was on hope. I couldn’t bring myself to leave you. I loved you too much. I couldn’t bring myself to leave you, not when I had any other choice. So I made myself believe every single one of your promises.

We reel them off together, all eight of our legs shaking as we try not to cry with the memory.

You love me. You’re gonna stay with me forever. You’re never gonna let this hurt us. No one but you, Lee-Lee. Never anyone but you.

And then you threw them back in my face. Emily, the one person who was there for me, my shoulder to cry on when you abandoned me. She promised, she swore she’d never forgive you for what you did to me, what you made me. But she did.

Leah…

I plow on, mercilessly. My dad had told me, time and again, since I was little, “Any boy hurts my Leah, and I’ll hurt him.” And once you left me? For my best friend, my own sister? He says, “Trust me, Lee, we’re all doing our best.” Like he was on your side. I couldn’t take it, I just couldn’t take it… I killed him, Sam, I killed him!

It’s not…

I interrupt him. Damn it, I know it isn’t! That doesn’t do a fucking thing about the guilt. You know you didn’t choose to make me like this. Doesn’t change the fact that you did.

Leah, and his thoughts are soft, will you ever forgive me?

Of course I will. I already have. I forgave you the moment you left. Because I love you, Sam. I want you to be happy. No matter what it costs me. You’re forgiven. But trust you? No. I’ll talk to you. I’ll run with you. I’ll fight for you. I’ll love you, hopelessly, forever. But I’ll never trust you again. I’m not a very trusting person, and the two people I love most slow-dancing together in the pieces of my heart don’t really help with that.

He listens to my rant in silence, his great black head bowing. Amazing, how much I love him still, like this, in this other body. He’s still Sam, still my Sam, the one I miss, the one I want, the one I love. The one I’ll never have.

Finally, he speaks. I’ve still got a wall.

What?

Like you. In my mind, I don’t show the others… He trails off, and I feel it, the blockade so like my own, with so much stowed behind it.